Integrate your
SAP Business One, Business by Design, S/4 Hana, ECC6, C4C, SalesCloud, Service Cloud
with HubSpot.

While its a robust and powerful software platform, SAP is typically highly customized. As such no simple out-of-the-box connector to HubSpot exists.

When you say you are using SAP, it’s like saying you are wearing shoes, whether they are boots, pumps, sneakers, Tap Shoes, Flip-Flops, etc. SAP offers hundreds of products.

This is why this page is a little longer than others and slightly boring. But if your company runs on SAP, you'll know why this is necessary.

Getting Started

 

At Periti, we’ve done dozens of SAP integrations and one thing we can say for sure is that every one is different. Before embarking on a HubSpot/SAP integration, it is  important to understand the division of labor between Marketing Automation, CRM, and ERP.  In which system does each process live? The answer to this will vary depending on the business and sales model.

In many companies, the ERP system is the ultimate source of truth and is also used for quote generation, even though it can be cumbersome to use it for this purpose. However, when FX rates might impact prices, and stock levels can impact availability and delivery time, it may be the best option. However, this is not the case in every sales model. In some cases, the CRM handles the entire sales process and hands over closed-won orders to the ERP for fulfillment and invoicing.

Let’s look at three basic variants. Each of these can be built upon by including further data, such as profit centre synchronisation or live warehouse stock level information. But what is necessary? 

The guiding principle is relevance.
If a company has a handful of new customers each month, it may not require automatic synchronization from CRM to ERP. On the other hand, if the company has dozens of new customers each month, automatic synchronization is wise. In this case, the CRM is the leading system and passes the data to the ERP.

Suppose the majority of orders are placed online. In that case, it is most logical to integrate the order data from the eCommerce system or ERP into the CRM to enable behavior-based marketing to the customer base. The potential for cross- and upselling, replacement sales, and tracking canceled orders is significant and can greatly increase revenue. In this case, ERP is the leading system and passes the data on to CRM and marketing automation solutions.

When trading physical goods stored in warehouses, the salespeople need to be able to see each SKU's stock level and location in real-time.

Let's talk about SAP!

CRM-ERP-1

Due to the complexity and variety of products, a bidirectional interface is necessary in many companies. For example, to have a direct overview of stock levels when making offers, quotes, and orders are often created in the ERP. New customers, on the other hand, often come from the marketing automation solution or CRM. 
CRM-ERP-2

Software or consulting firms do not have physical stock and often have a manageable service and product portfolio. Here, offers creating  orders in the CRM makes sense, but they should also be available in ERP for service provisioning and billing. 
CRM-ERP-3

If various distribution channels exist in parallel, things become more complex.. This happens when the business also sells parts of the products or services directly online. In this case, orders also come directly from the shop system into the ERP. However, to maintain a complete customer overview, it is necessary to either transfer this data from the commerce system or fetch the order data, including e- commerce contacts, from the ERP. 

Keep Old Data - There's Money in it!

Often, an ERP system is already in place and contains historical data that can be of immense value for CRM and marketing automation. This data can enable automated customer classification or targeted promotion. With respect to  up-selling, cross-selling, and re-selling, this historic data can be an absolute goldmine. 

Technical Integration Tips

Usually, you can utilize web interfaces to access SAP Business One, Business by Design, S/4 Hana, and C4C cloud systems. To do this, you must first set up  a technical users or communication agreement in the ERP. This agreement defines which data and services are available for CRM integration from the SAP system. In the case of Business One, use the service layer function or the B1IF integration framework (not recommended).


In most cases it is wise  to use an additional integration platform to orchestrate the sync. It is a great benefit if a product such as SAP CPI or PI/PO is available in-house. This set up is particularly useful if you are using other SAP products such as C4C (Cloud for Sales) or CPQ and HubSpot for  marketing automation.
Otherwise, AWS Lambda Workflows can take over this task and orchestrate the data synchronization.        


The flow is key to maintaining integrity and avoiding duplicates. For example, if the ERP assigns customer numbers, you must first create the business partner in the ERP via API. Once you’ve done this, the SAP customer numbers or indices can be taken over, and the integration process can create contacts, offers, and line items and assign them to the newly created or existing business partner.

Once you have defined the data flow, data mapping, and trigger criteria, it’s time to open up the systems by creating communication systems, scenarios, and arrangements in SAP. 

Increase efficiency

Greater transparency and a better cross-departmental flow of information within your company increases efficiency, avoids duplication of work, and allows employees to access high-quality and complete information faster.

Better customer experience

By integrating HubSpot and SAP data, you get a holistic view of your customers. The comprehensive information helps you make better decisions, avoid mistakes, and provide personalized customer care.

Boost Sales

Knowing exactly who bought what and when can help you identify upsell, cross-sell, and re-sell potential. You can also use this information to segment customers and execute very targeted marketing campaigns.

Improved data quality

When you integrate your CRM and ERP, you no longer have to transfer data from one system to the other manually. Not only will you reduce workload, you’ll also minimize errors and improve data quality.

Save license fee

By moving some processes from ERP to CRM, we’ve seen our clients realize significant savings on license fees. The ROI on these savings can be just a few months.

At Periti we have done dozens of HubSpot <-> SAP integrations across varied industries.

Contact us to request a case study or have a free consultation call.

Let's talk about SAP!